Posted
by
CmdrTaco
on Monday November 30, 2009 @12:42PM
from the works-for-baseball dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The European Commission analysis of ACTA's Internet chapter has leaked, indicating that the US is seeking to push laws that extend beyond the
WIPO Internet treaties and beyond current European Union law. The
document contains detailed comments on the US secret copyright treaty
proposal, confirming the desire to promote a 'three-strikes and you're
out' policy, a Global DMCA, harmonized contributory copyright
infringement rules, and the establishment of an international
notice-and-takedown policy."

No, evidence that there is a movement afoot by the US government to undermine the freedom and liberties of citizens of the world. You already have a corrupt copyright regime, now you're trying to foist it on the rest of the world.

get your head out of your patriotic ass. corruption knows no country or ethnic boundaries. if you are human, you are corruptable.

its a wave right now. all countries are joining in. they love it! their leaders, that is. the citizens all hate it. but their needs were NEVER important. any illusion of that was just that, an illusion.

you are either in power or not in power. and those in-power right now are enjoying a huge rape-fest of those that are not in-power.

The condo stuff you mention is because you didn't read the contract you were signing. I own my home and the ground its on so I can do what I damn well please. Pet regulations aren't just for rabies, they are humanitarian so we don't have streets teeming with unvaccinated starving wild dogs and feral cats like Calcutta. Car insurance is so you don't get hit by a deadbeat who won't pay to fix your car, and is a common protection. Emissions tests are really only in California so you giv

So what you're saying is that rabid adherence to a particular ideology is ridiculous, and instead, a combination of the better ideas of a series of ideologies would create a better system and one that provides a balance of positive benefits for all members involved?

In other words, we can find a balance between anarchy and fascism that provides a symbiotic relationship at the peak of some kind of curve.

Much of what you said is wrong, even if I don't, necessarily agree with the OP's rabid rant.

"I own my home and the ground its on so I can do what I damn well please."

This depends, entirely, on where in the US you live. Many, many parts of this country (especially in and around cities) have zoning laws that restrict what you can and can't do on your land (examples: no cars on blocks, no loud noises at all hours, building size limited based on lot size, zoning board final approval over what you want to build, etc.). You can get away from much of this by living way out in the country, but even that isn't a gaurantee. Then (as mentioned by someone else in this thread) there are eminent domain laws which say that the government can take your land at any time as long as they pay you for it. You may not like it, but they are the law.

"Pet regulations aren't just for rabies, they are humanitarian so we don't have streets teeming with unvaccinated starving wild dogs and feral cats like Calcutta. Car insurance is so you don't get hit by a deadbeat who won't pay to fix your car, and is a common protection."

both true enough.

"Emissions tests are really only in California so you give yourself away as being against liberalism simply to be contrary since you have the choice to live where you will, but then you wouldn't have anything to bitch about, no?"

Thanks, I'll have to remember to let them know that the next time the state of Illinois tries to fine me for not bothering to submit to their mandatory emissions checks. Also, someone should write a letter to the New York State DMV to let then know about the typo on their website where it says "All vehicles registered in New York State must get a safety inspection and an emissions inspection every 12 months. " (http://www.nydmv.state.ny.us/vehsafe.htm). Let's see, that's two examples of you being, outright, wrong in your facts (representing, might I add, a very large portion of the population and, by extrapolation, a large portion of this country's economic opportunity with which to support yourself and your family). How much you wanna bet we can find more if we look?

This, of course, brings us to the sheer BS of your basic premise of "you have the choice to live where you will, but then you wouldn't have anything to bitch about, no?". We all live in what I like to call "the real world". Of course it's possible to move if you don't like your states laws, but in the "real world" moving is often a harsh economic/social hardship on you and your family especially if you happen to own you house outright like you just got done advocating in your previous sentence. I think it's, more than a little, condescending to try and write off his argument with that kind of, flippant, response.

"Your tax info is just wrong. You have to file one return for State (that includes your whole family), one for Federal, and possibly a local/COUNTY"

That's only true if you are either young (and don't have all the complications of a full family and investment portfolio) and/or are willing to pay much more in taxes than the system is designed to charge you. When you start to have kids, houses/condos, investments, businesses, you start to have to file multiple extra tax forms at the state and federal level to declare everything and (more commonly) to claim tax credits/deductions. Before you start going on about how no-one if forcing him/her to claim all the credits/deductions, remember that the tax rate is calculated assuming that the people eligible for those credits/deductions will claim them. Without them, a person will be subjected to much higher taxes than they are supposed to (I'm talking about people who, honestly, have a claim to them, not to people that game the system to claim credits/deductions they don't, really, deserve). US taxes are not the simple, one form per government level, system you are trying to claim they are.

"Airline security is theater to make sure people don't stop (as I have) using the

Absolutely right. County-wide ordinances here pretty specifically define things you can and can't do on your own property. Aside from the obvious things like not being able to open a business on your own property if it's zoned as residential, there's other things. Unless it's licensed as a junk yard you can not house "abandoned vehicles" - with abandoned vehicles literally defined as anything without a plate and taxes being paid.

Even out in the rural areas you have to keep your grass cut to a certain leve

Poor you. Last time I checked, the US was not part of the European Union.

And the EU is notorious for disregarding the will of its citizenry in favor of whatever is convenient or profitable for the bureaucracy. Or for the governments of the larger controlling countries. The whole EU constitution process is a good example: An elaborate sham that deliberately avoided all that pesky interference by those backwards, unenlightened voters.

Unfortunately for you. This is the EU analysis of a proposal by US to an international body, and thus all the ideas put forward are suggested by the US. So by your word; the US is trying to create a supernational government and are lobbying the EU to support the idea.

That's a bit unfair.
The goal is undermining the freedom of all people.

Why? Why would they prefer to rule with an iron fist over oppressed and unhappy masses when they could instead be revered as wise leaders of a happy, prosperous, free people? What makes the former scenario so much more appealing to our leaders than the latter? Are they just sociopaths (or if they are, is that alone really a satisfying explanation?)?

I'd be interested in whether anyone can adequately explain that. Obviously it appears to be the case, but the "why" answer is either missing or unsatisfac

European home affairs ministers are today set to approve a transatlantic deal that will see them turn reams of private banking data over to US intelligence.

The expected approval signals a remarkable diplomatic victory for Washington. The European Commission and the US had previously clashed over the Terrorist Finance Tracking Programme (TFTP).

TFTP began in secret following the 9/11 terror attacks. It allows US authorities to monitor SWIFT, the Belgian company that acts as clearing house for millions of daily transactions between European banks.

Quiet? That topic was discussed in the media in Germany last week almost everyday (eg concerning various groups/institutions voicing their concerns, all of them having been disregarded today by the German government...)

I am not the GP. The topic was nowhere to be found in the "main" Dutch news media.

I think you underestimate the pacifism of most Americans. They just don't care anymore.

240 years ago the men that founded the USA were running away from what we have become. Freedom has given way to corporations needs and our ever more difficult struggle to maintain our standard of living. We need a revolt, but I just don't see that happening. Just look at even more repressed countries like Iran and North Korea.

The time has come and gone to make peaceful change, but the country will have to descend much farther into the depths of hell before people will get off their ass and make a change.

I don't think this treaty would pass in the US Senate. I would forsee the unlikely coalition of far rightists and far leftists actually collaborating to defeat this, just as they actually have on some other things.

Aha, but my understanding from earlier stories is that this is not being pursued as a regular treaty but instead as an executive agreement. Essentially the administration would agree to pursue regular legislation enacting these provisions, which only require a simple majority to pass, rather than a treaty that would require 2/3 of the senate. I doubt that anyone currently in the senate would burn the "political capitol" to filibuster to stop these from getting to the floor. Odds are they would break it u

What's more, because US treaties are backed by the power of the Constitution, they are very difficult to repeal later down the road if they turn out to be a bad idea, or, as is more often the case, the other governments back out of the treaty and leave the US holding the bag. Few countries put as much force of law behind treaties as the US. This is also one of the reasons the US never signed on to Kyoto, because it was assumed that the other countries wouldn't be able to make the ambitious targets and would quietly back out, whereas the US would be stuck with it.

What's more, because US treaties are backed by the power of the Constitution, they are very difficult to repeal later down the road if they turn out to be a bad idea, or, as is more often the case, the other governments back out of the treaty and leave the US holding the bag. Few countries put as much force of law behind treaties as the US. This is also one of the reasons the US never signed on to Kyoto, because it was assumed that the other countries wouldn't be able to make the ambitious targets and would quietly back out, whereas the US would be stuck with it.

Not true. Treaties ratified under the Treaty Clause [wikipedia.org] can be superseded by ordinary law. See the Head Money Cases [wikisource.org] (emphasis added):

The Constitution of the United States places such provisions as these in the same category as other laws of Congress by its declaration that

this Constitution and the laws made in pursuance thereof, and all treaties made or which shall be made under authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land.

In the US even? I mean I know our politicians are bought and paid for, but wouldn't 3-strikes and you're cut off violate due-process? Granted I haven't read all the details, but it's a bit hard to when it's you know, hidden away from all.

Time to fire up the printer and send off more letters to the Congress critters.

Due process? You're not going to jail. Your life and liberty aren't being threatened, only your Internet connection. It would be "administrative", like revoking your driver's license.

Except you don't need an Internet license (yet), so this would be the Federal government telling private businesses (ISPs) that they cannot do business with a group of people. Nasty, but it has been done in some forms before, such as background checks for gun purchases and the no fly list. But those were done in the name

I seriously doubt we'll here anything negative on the mainstream media about ACTA.

I share this doubt. The only major TV news outlet that's not MAFIAA-owned is PBS. All the rest share a corporate parent with an MPAA member: NBC, CNBC, and MSNBC are with Universal Studios, ABC is with Disney, CBS is with Paramount in National Amusements, and Fox News is with 20th Century Fox in News Corp.

On this point I am really saddened by the Obama administration. The 3-strikes-and-out is hugely unpopular including amongst artists. It is "lobbying for special interests" at its finest and really should not belong to the 21st century. There are already some countries who recognized access to internet as an opposable right.

I thought now there were progressives in the White House and in Senate ? Does nobody want geeks' votes anymore ? How many pirate party will be necessary in order for this madness to end ?

Blame the corrupt entertainment industry that lobbies our lawmakers into betraying the very people who elected them.

One can't get elected without the exposure that the news media offers. Look at how the press buried Ron Paul, for instance. I'd blame the lack of separation of news media and fictional entertainment: NBC, ABC, CBS, and Fox News are all owned by MPAA members.

Unfortunately, this treaty isn't a left/right thing (ACTA originated under the Bush administration, and the Obama administration is carrying on with it). Almost universally, the public hates it and the government loves it (save for a few principled politicians on both sides).

I'm unabashedly liberal, and I believe that there are places where the government can do a lot of good. This is definitely not one of those times. Rather than pointing fingers at other voters, what we need to do as the American public is band together and fight this thing.

probably should not feed the troll, but let me remind you of one simple fact:

as bad as obama is, the other choice would have fucked us over FAR WORSE.

yes, obama is disappointing. but we could only guess the kinds of damage the other guys would have done...just some perspective. yes, obama sucks right now. but it could be FAR worse. not exactly a pleasant thought but it might help to give perspective.

I realize that you have already had to deal with an invasion of Iraq to eliminate imaginary "weapons of mass destruction" and a world-wide financial collapse (although, to be fair, you bear some of the responsibility for that one... after all YOU believed our our uncritical rating agencies). And we're still stumbling around on that ruining-the-planetary-climate issue. So I know it's a big favor to ask, but would you please, PLEASE restrain my country's insane leaders?

I think the majority of Americans thought that they corrected the mistakes they made 9 and 5 years ago when they elected the most recent idiot to office. Unfortunately they just brought a whole new idiot with a whole different secret agenda.

In order to do your job, you'd have to vote them out of office. But you cant vote them out because your system in practice allows only two parties. The US hasnt had a third party winning somwhere since more than 100 years. 300 Million citizens and only _two_ fscking parties to vote for, every god-forgotten country-so-small-you-cant-find-on-the-map from the Balcans would laugh its collective ass off about calling that "democracy".

Add to that the fact that, at least regarding copyright, the two US parties basically agreed to form a cartel (MAFIAA isnt called MAFIAA for nothing), and youre simply out of luck.

Yes, at general elections there are, practically speaking, only two options. However, the US has a very open primary system. I'm not American, but my understanding is that all one has to do is check 'Democrat' or 'Republican' on voter registration forms to be allowed to participate. At primaries there ARE a broad range of ideas and philosophies presented. So yes, the final choice is between two... but those two are in turn selected through a democratic proces

That you could list significant third party and independent electoral victories in the U.S. on a postage stamp and have room to spare supports the proposition the the two party system is intractable, rather than weakens it.

So say you get kicked off the net - how do they enforce this? Just off the top of my head I can think of a dozen ways to browse the net semi-anonymously (coffee shop, library, college, neighbors wi-fi etc etc). Not to mention having internet access at work - does that mean I'd be denied employment world-wide for messing around on the net?

It starts with RFID chips being implanted into everyone, which is then used only for convenience (like purchases) and then slowly becomes more and more integrated into everyday life. All of your information will be stored on this device and you will be tracked by the Government always. You will end up needing your chip to log into/. (.) Eventually you'll need it to even Access the internet. And then, once they find that you are abusing their laws, they just shut off your RFID, leaving you absolutely helpless in the world because you won't be able to do anything.

THEN they put Flouride or something in the water to make people forget. And then we find out they faked the Jupiter Landing! And then Copyright Laws become even more strict and Insane then they are now, And then Apple Gets arrested for being too Open Source and everything goes to hell!!!!

As far as I know, the way the 3-strikes laws are supposed to work are only to disconnect your home ISP access. You're not 'banned' from the internet entirely, just from subscribing to it as a resident. I'm not so sure how this treaty works, though.

to point out that their INTENT is malicious and requires vocal opposition

but i am merely pointing out that regardless of their intent, they can have no real world effect

the intent of an ant might be to eat you, but who cares: its just an ant

governments do plenty of vile things in this world. however, in this specific arena, they are paper tigers: all bark and no bite. it is in fact a chance to laugh at their absurdity and make fun of their ineffectualness. of all the evils they could be fighting: corporate

By successfully censoring commercial art and removing it from the Internet, these clowns
only help us to popularize the free-as-in-freedom art. I agree: let them pass more copyright laws
if they so desire. Unlike with patents, nothing of value will be lost.

its nothing more than damage to route around, like the internet was designed to do

Consider the war on drugs before you boast. The US is willing to damage millions of people even if the outcome they want is virtually impossible. (And like the war on drugs, the people will favor harsh treatment for "pirates" also.)

your random grandmother or soccer mom will lose their internet access for what leachers on their insecured wifi do or what their children's friends do

and all the while the real action will move further underground, further encrypted, steganographed, obfuscated, made sparse, and otherwise evolved to be more and more resistant to any sort of inspection, interception or even tracking

Comparing the effects of widespread piracy of music and movies on a population and the effect of hard drugs is ridiculous. Lots of media is absolutely terrible and may be said to "rot your brain", but many, many of the kinds of drugs that are illegal really ruin people's lives and make them completely unemployable and a drain on the world.

I'm sure most of the population will get behind a law against life-wrecking hard drugs, but I can't see them rallying to stop piracy as hard. The negative side effects j

By all means, let's get writing, mailing, whatever. Set up a petition, a FB group and spam our MP's silly. I'm just a little vague on who to reach. Anyone with experience got some contact info for the various member states (EU, Canada, NZ, etc etc)?

By 2025 (at the current rate of advance sustained over the last 30 years) a TB of disk storage will cost about a penny. For $100, you will be able to buy a hard drive that will hold 2.5 *centuries* of HD video. While that might not be enough to hold all of mankind's copyrighted media, it will be more than enough to hold more media of whatever format will be in use in 2025 than a person could reasonably consume in their lifetime.

The point is, if we copyright any and every scrap of content produced, and maintain the same sorts of restrictions on such content that we enforce at the current time plus all the restrictions of the ACTA.... We will have no legal way to use a storage card we might get as a prize in a Cracker Jack box, much less a drive we actually buy.

And if people can carry around cheap storage sufficiently large to simply clone everyone's media libraries who they might meet, to sort out what they want later, who needs the Internet to "pirate"? (Thus what would be the real use of "Three Strikes"?)

When I write a joke, it is copyrighted. But jokes are so easy to repeat, and so hard to track that there isn't any way I can be paid for each time my joke gets retold. When media becomes easier to pass along than a joke, how can anyone require a payment for each retelling? There are other ways to be compensated, and the entertainment industry is going to have to learn to live with Moore's Law just like any high tech company does. Learn to leverage the efficiencies they gain with better technology to offset the loss of revenue that occurs as technology eliminates sources of income.

Live Concerts, Movie Theaters, endorsement deals, Shirts, and other value adds (plus who-knows what value adds might arise in the future) may be where the entertainment industry will have to go. Cheap (and I don't mean $10, or $5, or even $3) downloads of non DRM movies would bring in plenty of income from those that simply don't want to bother with other services.

Life is tough as technology takes away your income. But we are not going to kill the advance of technology, as much as the entertainment industry would like us to.

I thought the whole point of ACTA as a secret agreement was that it could be implemented by merely tweaking enforcement of existing law. I know of no element of US law that supports the 3 strikes notion. If Congress won't play ball, ACTA could fall apart no matter what the various international executive branches agree to.

As a self-employed game developer, I own the copyright on all the stuff I sell. While I can recognise the need for a unified global copyright system (and unified global laws on sales and export/import tax), my sales model assumes I can sell any given product for 10 years, and I would be perfectly happy if copyright durations were reduced to that. That said, 10 years may well be optimistic, and I doubt I would have any problems if it was reduced to 5 years. Anyone in a who must make their money back quickly is in the same boat — the rest of the profits are just "keeping score".

From what I've seen, this treaty is not going to make the world a better place, it's going to make it worse, especially given how little most people know about IP law (patent != copyright != trademark != database right != industrial design right != geographical indication != trade secret). Short duration IP-monopoly-rights are non-issues for rapidly moving industries, and shorter durations make it easier to move faster.

There will always be places that will say "no thanks" to this kind of stupidity for several rerasons:

1) They have some sense (rare but possible)2) They don't like US.3) Their laws wouldn't allow4) Their Constitution wouldn't allow.5) They don't want outsiders telling them how to do things specially if they can't do themselves.6) All of above?:)

You see there isn't a respectable IT firm anywhere in a developed nation that doesn't have a bit of a 'Swap Club', sharing pirated material by USB drives, SD cards and cheap terabyte class drives around the office. Back in the day they shared stuff on CD-R because the internet was rubbish. Now these things are now ubiqutous, inexpensive and expendable. Terabyte range drives are less than 10c per gig for a while now, if you find a good deal.

What happens when these things inevitably become alot smaller and alot cheaper?

What really scares me is what might be done to try to control this form of piracy.

Did you see the bit about legal enforcement of DRM provisions. LAN parties might get you out of having your ISP 3 strikes you; but they won't do you much good if possessing gear that can actually rip and copy stuff is about as safe as possessing Schedule 1 substances...

If, and only if, devices continue to be built in the "default allow" mode.

Consider the xbox360 or the PS3: Unless the hardware is subverted, one unit at a time, they will refuse to execute code that hasn't been cryptographically blessed by their respective overlords. Now, because the games are pressed onto disks for retail sale, this system would still be vulnerable to bit-for-bit disk clones; but in the (very likely) future download-heavy environment, this will likely be replaced by signed unique-per-device binaries, and devices that will execute only binaries that are designated for them, and signed.

Audio and video would be harder; because of the market pressure created by the large amounts of legacy material; but that is nothing that buying the right law couldn't fix.

As long as DRM is based on trying to build uncrackable systems, it is(as you say) absurdly impossible. Any one crack means a plaintext copy circulating freely. If, however, you create a DRM scheme that is "default deny" instead of "default allow", it suddenly becomes a great deal more plausible. If a device will only interact with material signed by a trusted party, a plaintext copy is useless. If some trusted party does sign a pirated copy of something, they can simply be revoked.

Sure, there'll still be hacked devices(or built from scratch devices) floating around that can read plaintext copies of things) and people who play cat-and-mouse by stealing signing keys and signing pirated material and circulating it until those keys get burned; but it will be radically harder than it is now. Even worse, depending on how exactly you design the crypto key hierarchy, you could even use it as a means of punishment. Say, for instance, that (because of strong pressure from holders of legacy non-DRMed material) our hypothetical DRM system allows users to sign previously plaintext material themselves, in addition to automatically signing future documents they create. If material you have signed ends up circulating P2P and your key is revoked, all your documents become unreadable. Any number of unpleasant elaborations are possible.

People like you are as much a problem as Big Media's absurd power grabs. You are unashamedly breaking the law, which makes you the poster boy for Big Media when they are pushing for ever more extreme laws. And while you will deserve it if you ever get screwed by those laws, lots of people will wind up suffering through no fault of their own if these measures go through.

The thing is, I don't have a problem with the basic principle of copyright, and frankly, I'm not sure most people do.

Sure, it sucks if you want the latest and greatest works but you can't afford the asking price. Life is tough. But whenever we have these discussions, no-one in the "everything should be free" camp seems to have a credible alternative system that still produces plenty of high quality works.

So, why don't you see if you can do better? Describe a credible system in which anyone can copy anything

Describe a credible system in which anyone can copy anything without restriction but there is still sufficient incentive for people to produce and share high quality work in the first place

Assurance contracts [wikipedia.org]. The author specifies a bounty amount, fans pledge money, and if the sum of pledges meets the bounty amount, the author is contractually bound to publish the work under a free license.

This idea is a common proposal in these discussions, so let me ask you a few basic questions about it.

Most obviously, how does a new artist get started this way, when he doesn't have any fans yet? Are consumers expected to start pledging to random people on the off-chance that they produce a good result? There is nothing to stop someone adopting this approach today. How many artists have successfully started a career by doing so?

The copyright system lets an artist who thinks they can make a good product do so, and if the product turns out to be good it can be its own recommendation. The artist bears the risk rather than the consumer base, and the artist can reap rewards proportionate to how many people benefit from their work and how much value those people perceive the work to have. (I appreciate that in reality Big Media get in the way of this, and I have no problem with changing the copyright structure to keep the rights with the artists and other creative people where they belong, but this does not undermine the fundamental idea behind copyright.)

Most obviously, how does a new artist get started this way, when he doesn't have any fans yet? Are consumers expected to start pledging to random people on the off-chance that they produce a good result? There is nothing to stop someone adopting this approach today. How many artists have successfully started a career by doing so?

You don't start off a career that way. You start by loving your art and marketing yourself for free. Then you might want to consider doing some commission work. Only then do you start considering the kind of contract that the GP proposes here (and I have from time to time proposed for years).

I've seen artists rise through the ranks this way (only that currently, the artists use more traditional business models at the top). It happens often enough in the community in which I observe that I think it scalable

Do you? Civil disobedience involves publicly breaking the law and accepting the consequences. The key point there is the "accepting the consequences" part. Are you making a show of infringing copyright and accepting the full consequences of the law to make your point?

Because if you're knowingly breaking the law without that, it's not civil disobedience, it's just illegal.

Before copyright came along, it was very expensive to make copies of works anyway. As someone else already pointed out, copyright followed only a few years after the invention of the printing press.

It's odd that people are so quick to point out the changing world when saying copyright should be abandoned, yet so slow to notice that the evidence they give for the viability of alternatives predates those same changes.

current artists and entertainers whose works are not covered by copyright?

And who are they, and how much material do they produce and of what quality, relative to artists whose works are covered by copyright?

Describe a credible system in which anyone can copy anything without restriction but there is still sufficient incentive for people to produce and share high quality work in the first place, and I'm sure the sceptics like me will be interested in what you have to say.

So, why don't you see if you can do better? Describe a credible system in which anyone can copy anything without restriction but there is still sufficient incentive for people to produce and share high quality work in the first place, and I'm sure the sceptics like me will be interested in what you have to say.

It's called "not having copyright," and it was good enough to give us Shakespeare and Milton.Really, what's the problem here? Are we worried about musicians? The vast majority of popular musicians would make more money working at a 7-11 than they do during their time on the market under the major labels.Are we worried about books? People have been writing books without copyright for as long as there's been books. The publishing industry is collapsing under its own weight, because of the abundance of free content out there (since the Internet appears to prove that people prefer "free" to "good").Are we worried about movies?...why? Hollywood comes up with maybe two worthwhile ideas a year. Before I fight you on that one, I'd like to hear your explanation of any system that will actually cause people to produce and share high-quality movies, since it sure isn't happening now.

Really, for someone with a sig protesting the power of the state, you seem awfully chipper about "property" that's been wholly invented by the government.

1. Perhaps it's true that most popular musicians would be better off working at 7-11... but if that were true they'd be spending their time working at 7-11, not making music. So that doesn't actually address the point.

2. Gutenberg invented his press in 1436. Copyright was invented in Venice in 1486, a mere 50 years later. So no, people have not been writing books without copyright for as long as there's been books. Again, that doesn't address the point.

1. The point being, strong monetary incentives are not necessary for people to produce quality works (or whatever passes for it) in the music business.

2. So now no books were written prior to 1486? Pfft. Besides, early copyright was (1) laughably poorly enforced, and (2) primarily intended to ensure the accuracy of the text, rather than the profitability of the print shop.

3. It produces works terrible enough that people won't watch them on the terms offered by the market. "People won't pay to see your mov

It's called "not having copyright," and it was good enough to give us Shakespeare and Milton.

I'm not sure we'd have had a Shakespeare if he had lived in an age in which anyone could record and distribute plays at near-zero cost. You don't need so much copy protection if it's already hard to copy your work.

So, why don't you see if you can do better? Describe a credible system in which anyone can copy anything without restriction but there is still sufficient incentive for people to produce and share high quality work in the first place, and I'm sure the sceptics like me will be interested in what you have to say.

It is a system just like ours, but without copyright. It's a very credible system, as it worked very well for some 10000+ years and gave us epic works of art of every form imaginable: literature (fiction and non-fiction), music, architecture, painting & drawing, live acting, to name just a few. There is not a shred of evidence that copyright provides an actual incentive to create artistic works, i.e. that fewer works would be created without copyright, or that the overall quality would suffer. Not a shr

It is a system just like ours, but without copyright. It's a very credible system, as it worked very well for some 10000+ years and gave us epic works of art of every form imaginable: literature (fiction and non-fiction), music, architecture, painting & drawing, live acting, to name just a few.

And how many Hollywood blockbusters with $100 million budgets did that produce?

How many million-lines-of-code software products?

How many detailed, fact-checked, well-edited 1,000 page textbooks?

For that matter, how many good books did it produce per year, and how many people got to read them?

I've never disputed that valuable works have been or would be created without the benefit of copyright protection, but the scale matters. You can't just extrapolate from the fact that some good works were produced and s

Nah, these laws are a very recent phenomena. I think if you put copyright in the context of entire world history you'll see that great works of art were also produced in times when there was no copyright. A lot of our intellectual property laws, especially those concerning patents, are descended only recently from Elizabethan English law where the monarch granted trading monopolies and guilds were formed to eliminate competition.

You think Homer wouldn't have written The Odyssey if they'd been no copyrigh

this is simply an arms race. we know from history that those never 'finish' they just keep on going. this one will, too, if put into place.

That is debatable. If they can get things like "3 strikes" passed, then the next step is to push for custodial sentences for repeat infringers who find ways to dodge the third strike, or licensing just for the "privilege" of being able to use an Internet connection. I think once the news starts carrying pictures of students getting locked up for three months or fined enough to bankrupt them because by their own admission they ripped off all their media, a lot of people who casually infringe because of the l